Words and Photos By Keith May
(Originally appeared in Cycle World magazine)
So there I was, dancing on the grave of Robert Johnson, peeling my clothes off like some ecstatic medicine-man. Thousands of angry fire-ants—an army from hell—filling me with deadly poison.
Rewind 48 hours. Memphis, Tennessee. 706 Union Avenue. Sun Studios. The historic corner Sam Phillips, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis Presley turned R&B into Rock and Roll. Surrounded by vintage microphones and empty guitar stands, I felt the bliss a Christian feels on Easter and loitered as long as possible, inhaling the moldy, but rarified air. A Sun Anthology purchased at the counter became the soundtrack for loping through the Mississippi Delta in a rented Ford Mustang.
I was following journalist Peter Egan in a “Search for Robert Johnson” and photographing his adventure. Yes, that Robert Johnson–the black hustler who sold his soul at the crossroads to play guitar like the devil. And, yes, that Peter Egan. The patron-saint of motorcycle journalism. He was on a shiny new Triumph Bonneville, and I wasn’t. Motorcycles don’t have radios or roofs however, and I counted my blessings when the rain came. Wipers slapping time to “Mystery Train,” “Bear Cat,” “Born to Lose,” “Ooby Dooby” and “Great Balls of Fire.”
Grey, two-lane blacktop unfurling through a flat, cotton-blanketed horizon. Crop-dusters briefly interrupting the hypnotic landscape. Hot gumbo and cold beers. Fried catfish and hungry mosquitos. Tombstones and honky-tonks. Beale Street, Clarksdale, Rosedale and Highway 61. Sunrise coffees and late nights on the dark side of town. Daydreaming in the land of cotton. Of crossroad blues and the ghost of Robert Johnson.
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